State auditor meets with local leaders, highlights reform efforts

State Auditor Suzanne M. Bump said she wants her office to go beyond flagging problems in programs and to target why they happened in the first place.

ANIKA CLARK

NEW BEDFORD — State Auditor Suzanne M. Bump said she wants her office to go beyond flagging problems in programs and to target why they happened in the first place.

On Thursday, Bump met with about 30 local leaders, educators and activists, giving an overview of her office and the steps she has taken to improve its function.

The Office of the State Auditor serves as the state's financial overseer through activities that range from auditing government departments to investigating fraud in public assistance.

"I want to use the auditors office to look at systems within government and not just flaws in programs," said Bump during lunch at the Wamsutta Club, which former Mayor Scott Lang hosted with attorney Margaret "MarDee" Xifaras.

As an example, Bump cited the auditing of educational collaboratives, which jointly fund certain services.

Examining findings from a handful of collaboratives revealed a system-wide problem, she said.

"The school committees weren't getting the information they needed from a fiscal accountability point of view," she said, before describing how the discovery sparked reform legislation. "And the Department of Education didn't have sufficient authority to set real standards for the operation of the collaboratives."

After taking office in 2011, she said, she welcomed an external peer review of the auditor's office, which found deficiencies in audit planning and documentation and other federal standards.

Among her ongoing reforms, Bump said she is working to raise the professional bar of her office staff and to make better use of technology and methods of data analysis.

"The auditor's office had a reputation I think over the years of being a place that if they didn't call you, don't call them," Lang told the audience. "She's trying to change that."

Among those attending Thursday's lunch were state Reps. Antonio F.D. Cabral and Robert Koczera, both New Bedford Democrats; Rep. Paul Schmid, D-Westport; Bristol County District Attorney and 9th Congressional District candidate C. Samuel Sutter; and School Committee Vice Chairman Marlene Pollock.